


scattered in flocks of ruin

by ThatWeirdGuyInTheBushes



Category: Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Depression, Fundy-centric, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hurt No Comfort, Non-Graphic Violence, Past Injuries, Sad Floris | Fundy, They/Them Pronouns for Eret (Video Blogging RPF), Traitor Eret (Video Blogging RPF), i guess theres some fluff if you squint
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-13
Updated: 2020-11-13
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:21:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27538270
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatWeirdGuyInTheBushes/pseuds/ThatWeirdGuyInTheBushes
Summary: Fundy watches the blood on Eret’s hand. He watches their sunglasses, reflecting the moonlight.And he’s still crying, still reeling, still trying, trying, trying, and he hesitates before he walks away.-Fundy always hesitates. He's tired of it.
Relationships: Eret & Floris | Fundy, Floris | Fundy & Toby Smith | Tubbo, Floris | Fundy & Wilbur Soot, dont ! ship ! real ! people !
Comments: 8
Kudos: 172





	scattered in flocks of ruin

**Author's Note:**

> fox boy angst go brrrrr
> 
> title from the poem "autumn" by Siegfried Sassooon

Fundy hesitates.

It’s Fundy and Eret, standing side by side. It’s Fundy and Eret, watching Wilbur drag Tommy out of the water. It’s Fundy and Eret, watching Dream walk away.

Fundy’s shoulders shake, tears dripping off his chin as he sobs and tries to process what he is seeing, tries to process what a life without Tommy would even look like. And Eret comes up beside him and tries to place a hand on his shoulder.

Fundy turns on his heel and punches Eret in the face. They fall to the ground, clutching their nose. He walks away. But he hesitates first.

He watches the blood on Eret’s hand. He watches their sunglasses, reflecting the moonlight.

And he’s still crying, still reeling, still trying, trying, trying, and he hesitates before he walks away.

-

He held Tubbo when Tommy left. Fundy cursed Tommy to the underworld and back and he held Tubbo while Wilbur paced outside the van and Tommy bought their freedom.

Tubbo was in a state, after Tommy’s duel. Hazy-eyed, out-of-it, shaking so hard he couldn’t hold a cup of tea. So Fundy stayed because someone had to. He remembers falling asleep with Tubbo’s head on his shoulder.

Gods, that had made him feel old.

When they woke up to find Tommy gone, Tubbo ran. Fundy tried to run after him, tried to shout because Tubbo was still injured, but he tripped on his own pain. He pressed a hand to the bandages on his side and cursed Eret, and cursed Tubbo, and cursed himself a little too.

And Tubbo came back, Tommy’s arm slung around his shoulder. The kids were grinning. These stupid kids that Wilbur roped into his stupid war were clinging to each other, bruised, wounded, and grinning. Fundy hated his father, for just a minute there. He scooped them both into a hug.

He thinks that he hesitated then, too. He can’t remember anymore.

-

The first time that Fundy speaks to Eret after the duel, it’s outside L’Manbergs walls. Eret is still taller than him. Fundy doesn’t know why he thought that would change.

Their nose is still a little crooked from the punch. Fundy hopes it stays that way.

Fundy tries not to notice the bags under Eret’s eyes, tries not to notice the way they cannot stand straight or the way their hands shake. Fundy tries not to notice how their crown is covered in dust.

“Why are you here?”

Eret pauses, taking off their crown and running their fingers over the ridges. “I’m sorry,” they say.

Fundy replies. But he hesitates first.

He pulls the words out of his throat, pries them off the roof of his mouth, and spits them at Eret’s feet.“I never want to see you near L’Manberg’s walls again, Eret. And you better hope you don’t see me.” His stomach acid creeps up, lying in wait at the tip of his tongue. He lets it out. “Cause if you do, I’ll fucking kill you.”

-

Sapnap killed his pet, and Sapnap killed his pet, and Sapnap killed and Sapnap killed and Sapnap-

-

Wilbur sits with him. Fundy lays in bed for two days, unwilling to get up, unwilling to move. He stares at the wall. He feels Wilbur sitting on the other end of the bed and tries not to care.

Wilbur brings him food. Wilbur stays by his side. Wilbur works at the cramped desk Fundy keeps in the corner and hardly speaks once. Fundy tells him to go more times than he can count. It’s not like he needs the President here all the time. He thinks everything would turn out the same if Wilbur only visited.

Sometimes, Fundy wonders if this is how Wilbur loves. In the things he doesn’t have to do.

-

Back in the war, Sapnap burnt the forest down.

Wilbur’s lungs still rattle with that smoke. He can’t run anymore, not like he used to. He hunches over, body bent as he coughs, and his whole body shakes because of what that fire’s done.

Sapnap shot his fox, just because he could.

Sapnap’s the one who hurt Tubbo, in that tiny box Eret nearly killed them in.

Tubbo and Tommy try to race around L’Manberg. They stretch before, and Tubbo still can’t raise his left arm above his head. He comes to Fundy’s house for potions, whenever the pain gets too bad.

Fundy doesn’t know why he hesitates this time.

Sapnap shoots first, and it costs Fundy half of his ear.

-

“You’re a fool sometimes, Fundy,” Wilbur tells him after, wrapping up his head. “Why didn’t you shoot?”

Fundy claws around inside himself and can’t find any words.

-

Wilbur is consolidating his power. Quackity is not going to let him.

Fundy is tired of not shooting.

-

“Why didn’t you support me?” Wilbur’s grabbed him by the sleeve of his suit, pulled him aside, out of the courthouse, into the hall.

_Maybe I want to be more than your supporter_ , he tries to say, but nothing comes out. Fundy can never seem to speak right when he’s speaking to Wilbur. He yanks his sleeve away, stomping out of the courthouse with Niki by his side. He’ll find the words again. He will.

-

Schlatt wins.

Wilbur is cast out. Fundy is happy, or at least he thinks he is. There’s a lightness to his chest (or maybe its a hole). There’s joy in his step (or maybe that’s just fear). The air is always clearer, nowadays (Or maybe that’s just the wind blowing through the places where the wall once stood).

Wilbur sends a note to Niki. Wilbur sends a note to everyone, it seems, except Fundy. _Be safe,_ it says. _Make it out alive. - Wilbur Soot._

Fundy sits on top of the caravan and watches the sunset. He wonders if this is how Wilbur hates. In the things he never does.

-

Schlatt doesn’t tell him to burn down the flag.

Fundy thinks about Wilbur’s old lungs, about Tubbo’s arm, about his pet fox and Tommy’s shattered grin. He thinks about Eret, daring to apologize, and he thinks the flag might catch fire just from how hard he’s glaring.

It doesn’t. He has to do that part himself.

Niki’s scream echoes through the valley after he does it. Eret calls him a bastard. Fundy can feel Wilbur crying, halfway across the kingdom. He burns the flag because he hates it, what it stands for, what it makes him feel and what it makes him remember.

He strikes flint against steel and promises himself he will not hesitate, this time.

But he still holds the match above the cloth for a few seconds too long, and he can’t convince himself that he was doing anything else.

Fundy will always hesitate before he hurts someone. But he still does it. That’s why he stands next to Schlatt instead of Wilbur. Because no matter how much he hesitates, he never stops.

**Author's Note:**

> pls comment i want validation


End file.
